Drenched Thoughts – A Review
Malashri Lal reviews “Drenched Thoughts” by Anita Nahal which is a compelling journey of an Indian single mother in the American diaspora. She delves into Priya’s struggles and triumphs, highlighting themes of identity, motherhood, and cultural dichotomy.
A riveting novel on how to survive as an Indian single-mom in the American diaspora, Anita Nahal has produced a narrative that captures a range of experiences and emotions of this special identity. Refusing to cut a sorry figure of victimhood in her troubled marriage, and also rejecting the stereotype of the struggling migrant arriving in the USA with a young child, Priya’s admirable determination to succeed against all odds arouses the reader’s curiosity as well as scrutiny. Drenched Thoughts is in itself an intriguing and bold title—the leitmotif of a woman bathing and thinking of her journey in life, as she prepares for her son’s wedding ceremony. The little boy who was dependent on his mother is now on the verge of his separate life—and all the struggles that Priya encountered in building opportunities for her own success and that of her son, now stand as ‘family history’. With that realization come questions–a crowd of them. Will she be able to confront her divorced husband and her own family in India who were emotionally destructive when she needed help? Will she be able to let go the son for whose future—as much as her own—she made the perilous journey to the USA after abandoning a secure job in New Delhi? Priya takes a long, very long, shower, as the vignettes appear and fade from Priya’s inner vision—and the wedding garments of a mother/ mother- in- law wait to be donned. Of the many metaphors of water-cleansing and dressing—I find Anita Nahal’s use alluringly complex. It is, simultaneously, like a religious bathing-ritual and also a secular extravaganza.
The key to Priya’s diaspora identity is encrypted, I think, in the note from her son on his wedding day. Along with a beautiful bouquet of flowers, it says, “I can’t thank you enough! Love you, always, your son”. Priya thinks, “Time rolled like movie projectors and kissing the note, she placed it safely in her fabric tote.” (35)
Mother-love is a complex, culturally coded phenomenon, and Drenched Thoughts explores this in multiple ways. While the core story is about Priya and Avijeet relocating from India to the USA, it’s also about Priya’s relationship with her parents, a talented but stern father, and a censorious mother. It looks also into the expectations of marital love in India where Priya and Satinder might build a home, family, and career in a familiar domain. The relationship floundered into abuse and violence. When Priya was offered a fellowship to a prestigious university in the USA, it was an opportunity on the other side of a cultural chasm. Motherhood, family, professionalism, economy, community support—everything is so different there, and Priya knows this. With a young child to support as a single mom, after the plethora of connections in India, can she dare make the move? However, it seemed everyone wanted her to go! Satinder, Priya’s husband, sees her fellowship as a ‘status symbol’ ( 91), her father views it as an ‘exciting’ adventure, mom has passed away and a rapacious brother has moved into the home, Priya’s marriage is on the rocks, and she hopes for an escape too.
Now enjoying the caress of the drenching shower on Avijeet’s wedding day, the reels of the past no longer hurt Priya. It is almost exhilarating to self-reflect how she has arrived, singularly, at this point when her son has expressed unconditional love and society has recognized her achievements. The novel oscillates tantalizingly between the past and the present, India and the US, domestic and public life, youth and age, hope and distress. Yet the story is intricately structured such that there is no ‘judgement’ but empathetic understanding: “As Priya grew older, the tattoos of her birth country and her life there became more resilient in her memory. Sometimes nicking her like someone threw hot sand into her socks, and sometimes a huge feeling of overwhelming emotions dropped on her like a tap without a washer.” (103)
Structurally, Drenched Thoughts uses an unusual technique of combining prose and poetry. Largely, the sections on the past are in free verse narrating the beauty as well as the agony of her time in India. One can feel the palpable joy of a woman teacher with a group of admiring students in Delhi who are attempting to understand feminism (115). Equally, the cruelty of a ruinous marriage also finds its way in terse lines. The later part of the novel continues to use this dualistic narrative technique and several ecstatic passages are about acquiring American citizenship for mother and son. The signpost of an ‘arrival’, this guarantees protection by the law of the land, for however brave Priya may sound through her struggling years as an immigrant, there is a haunting fear that her estranged Indian family may harm her.
One matter sharply divides the cultural norms of USA and India and that is the perception of sexuality and romantic love—we are speaking of the 1980s, not modern practices. Anita Nahal has candidly explored the implications of segregated lives of women and men in ‘middle-class’ India, and the sexual freedom that prevails in the USA. As a successful woman, with a grown up son, Priya is tempted my men promising security and permanence in the USA, and she takes a few tentative steps. Then her gritty resolve to remain the controller of her destiny returns sharply—and she continues on her chosen path of singleness. Today Avijeet is married. Water, the element of purification, of cleansing and fresh beginnings, as in a Ganga snaan (ritual bathing in the River Ganges) surrounds Priya. “And then she cried and cried her heart out, her distresses out, her old haunts out, and then came relief, all culminating in one big pool of mush” (192).
Drenched Thoughts is a sophisticated and insightful novel of comparable cultural values in India and the USA—and it is personalized in a poignant tale of love and self-discovery. For diaspora studies, this novel is both innovative and indispensable.
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